


A Night at The Ol' Station

by Calamityjim



Series: Bird's Night Out [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Action, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Humor, Tim Drake is Robin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-18 16:54:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29121525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calamityjim/pseuds/Calamityjim
Summary: What was *supposed* Tim's first night solo patrolling after the Red Hood attacked the Teen Titan's Tower is cut short when's he's forced to spend it at the Police Precinct because *someone* reported Batman to CPS. But Tim's got this.Doesn't he?
Series: Bird's Night Out [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2138775
Comments: 43
Kudos: 369





	A Night at The Ol' Station

**Author's Note:**

> This was a prompt on Batman being reported to the CPS and him just handing Tim over to the Cops being like Fine. You Take Care Of Him. 
> 
> It ended up, well, eh
> 
> No trigger warnings apply.

Jim stared at his cellphone. If he were a different man, if he were a richer man, he would have flung the device across the room in the hopes that it would shatter. Instead he tapped the power button, letting the screen flick to black and carefully tucked it into his pocket. 

This was a mess. It was also a police station, so messes were to be expected. No one called the police because something nice had happened and they were just _itching_ to tell strangers about their day. But even for Gotham, this was a mess. Gordon would rather deal with an Arkham breakout than the bullshit that had just been dumped on him. 

Jim knew he turned a blind eye to Batman and let the man operate with impunity. He got the job done and he didn’t kill people. When Jim had just joined the force that was a high standard, one that most of the cops he knew didn’t meet. The police had gotten better, were better, mostly because Batman had weeded through the bad ones with the same careful brutality that he applied to most criminals, cleaning Jim’s house to allow the man to actually get some goddamn work done. 

If it wasn’t for Batman Gotham wouldn’t even have a justice system. 

So yeah, Jim turned a blind eye. 

Apparently someone was tired of that. 

If they had just called Jim he would have done what he always did when it came to investigations involving Batman and brushed it under the rug. A half hearted promise that he was putting his best men on it, a shrug, and a story on how they couldn’t find anything. 

But this asshole had also called Donalda Holt. 

Don’t get Jim wrong. He respected the hell out of Don. She was good people and she was cutting through the mess that was Gotham’s foster care system. He’d been working pretty closely with her to root out families that were collecting money on kids they’d turned back onto the street or worse, sold to traffickers. It was hard heart wrenching work but Don had rolled up her sleeves and knocked past anyone who was in her way. She was a Bowery native, had survived the system herself, and knew how to dive into the putrid heart of it.  
  
She was like a dog with a bone. 

  
She was also like a dog with a bone. 

Which means that she wasn’t going to ignore or allow Jim to sweep reports that Batman was abusing Robin under the rug. He didn’t know if the caller had meant that Batman was smacking the kid around or if he was just referring to the fact that a grown man had let a child out in costume to fight crime _in Gotham_. Not that it would have been appropriate in any other city but Gotham had one of the highest crime rates compared to...well… Gordon didn’t like to think of where Gotham compared globally. 

So the tipster may have had a point, but at least this one wore pants. 

As expected, his phone started to ring. Jim checked his call display and sighed. “Hi, Don. Yeah, I got the call too.”

X-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Tim had been soaring through the city solo tonight. It had taken a month long campaign of wheedling, passive aggressive warfare, and painstakingly made powerpoint presentations to get Bruce to _finally_ let Tim back out on the street without Batman breathing down Robin’s neck. He got that Bruce was just being careful after the whole Red Hood fiasco in the Titan’s Tower, but Tim didn’t exactly wander around the city rooftops thinking he was safe. It was a completely different set of circumstances and Tim now knew to run like hell if the Hood showed up to kick his ass. 

So when the Bat Signal lit up, Tim didn't think anything of it. The Bat Signal was Batman’s domain. Tim would handle the Fashion District tonight. It was still kid’s stuff, Tim could patrol the Fashion District when he was sleep deprived, concussed, and wounded with no issues and tonight Tim was only one of those things. Not that Bruce knew. It was none of his business that Tim had spent the last three nights working on yet another powerpoint presentation in case Bruce had said no once again. Tim was actually a little disappointed he didn't get to use this one. He was particularly proud of the transitions.

Meh. He’d save it for another time. 

Then Batman had roughly radioed in, “Robin. Bat Signal. Now.”

Tim felt a mix of grim excitement stirring in his chest. He loved the thrill of doling out justice, of helping keep the city safe, but he understood the seriousness of the crimes that tore through Gotham, the pain of her people. Robin wasn’t a game. It was a duty.

He landed on the roof of the Goth City Precinct, game face on and ready to dig into whatever disaster was tearing through the city. 

Commissioner Gordon was there, as expected.

The woman with the clipboard was not. Her clothes were practical and would have been professional if not for the fact that they were rumpled from the day’s wear. She seemed to carry the same air of harried exhaustion about her, the same dour determination, as Gordon did. Obviously she worked in the public sector. Doing what Tim could only guess. 

Tim turned to Batman, silently asking for an explanation. 

The man wouldn’t even look at Tim. 

“Robin.” Oh fuck. She was using _the tone._ Tim knew that voice because he’d heard it before. He’d been taught to _use_ it. 

He held up a hand in a sharp stop motion. “Nope. Going to need you to stop right there. I’m a vigilante, not a victim.”

There was a sharp exhale and Tim understood why Batman wouldn’t look at him. He was trying not to laugh.  
  
The asshole. 

“Now Robin-”  
  
Tim cut Gordon off. “Seriously? Someone contacted Child Protective Services? On Batman?” Which was kind of amazing, truly, but also absolutely bonkers. Tim used a hand to motion up and down his body. “Look, you can tell I’m being fed enough. I obviously have access to adequate healthcare and I have the disposition of a happy child.”  
  
“You are being placed in harm’s way,” the woman argued softly, as though Tim was unaware of the gravity of being a vigilante. 

“It’s _Gotham,_ ” Tim pointed out. “I was out wandering the streets as a kid anyway, but now that I’ve joined Batman I’m doing it in body armour and have half an idea how to protect myself.” He twirled his bo staff for emphasis. 

Gordon raised an eyebrow as the woman crinkled hers. Great. Tim had made them even more concerned. He opened his mouth to try and offer more assurances, but Batman cut him off. 

“We are fully cooperating. Commissioner Gordon and Miss Holt will take you into custody for questioning. In exchange for your good behaviour, Miss Holt has agreed to not attempt to unmask you. If I am deemed to be neglectful in your care then the three of us,” Tim was pretty sure he was not the third person who was going to be consulted, “will move forward with how to care for you.”  
  
Tim narrowed his eyes. “I told you I’m _fine._ You promised I’d be able to patrol tonight.”

“You are not to leave this building. If you do there will be no hanging with the Teen Titans for a year. Be good,” Bruce ordered and then the asshole dropped some fucking smoke pellets and disappeared into the night. 

That fucking prick.

“Robin,” and oh god she was still speaking in _the tone._ “I understand that this situation may be stressful for you, but I can assure you that we’re only trying to help.” Dick never had to put up with this bullshit. “Let’s go down stairs and get you some hot chocolate, okay?” She motioned towards the door. 

Tim had little choice other than to do what she said. He tossed a look over his shoulder, scanning to see if he could spot a smirking Bruce in the shadows, but all he received was Gordon’s helpless shrug.  
  
It did not appease him. 

The bullpen went silent as Robin stepped into sight. There was a soft ‘holy shit’ from his left. It seemed like the world had paused and never before had Robin been more aware that vigilantism was technically illegal. There was a scuff of a chair as a detective made his approach. Miss Holt stepped between the man and Tim, but the detective ignored her, holding out a photo of the man and what must have been his wife and kids. 

“Will you sign this?”

It was like an explosion went off. Miss Holt was forced to the side as pens, photos, and scraps of paper were pushed in front of Tim’s face. It was as bad as when he was wandering around as Tim Drake-Wayne, except at least then he had a signature ready to go. He nearly signed the detective’s photo with his _real_ name and wouldn’t that have been embarrassing?

He used his left hand, knowing that it would never match the writing from his day to day life, and the detective practically squeaked as he hurried off to be replaced by another. Tim was pretty sure he signed someone’s uniform. He didn’t know how many signatures he’d given out before Gordon whistle.  
  
“Alright. Now that you’ve proven to Robin that you’re all a bunch of fangirls, I’ve got actual business with him. We’ll be in conference room one and we aren’t to be interrupted unless there is a goddamn breakout. Understood?”

There was a general assent from the room. 

Gordon shook his head and ushered Tim and Miss Holt into the safety and _privacy_ of the conference room. 

Miss Holt pushed back a stray lock of hair that was escaping her bun. She pulled the papers from her clipboard and tapped the ends on the table so they fell back into a perfect rectangle. She motioned for Tim to sit in a padded chair before taking her own seat. Gordon leaned against the wall, chewing the end of an unlit cigarette. 

“Now Robin,” she said, “I can tell you’re quite stressed so we’ll make this as quick as we can, okay?” Tim was absolutely done with her trying to handle him. 

“Now Miss Holt,” he responded in the same fucking voice she’d been using all night, “I can tell you’re quite tired so we’ll make this as quick as we can, okay?” he responded, matching that sympathetic but not pitying voice that he used to sooth victims and witnesses into cooperation. He was not a witness and he was definitely not a victim, but if she didn’t cut it out he was going to be guilty of property damage. He was pretty sure he could toss the chair beside him through the conference room window.  
  


Judging by the way Gordon was rubbing his nose he might not even get a lecture. After all, Bruce could pay for it. 

Miss Holt’s lip quirked. “Call me Don, please,” and she was finally talking like a normal human being. It was a small relief. “I have a few questions for you and I need you to answer as best you can.”

Tim rolled his eyes but the gesture was lost behind the whiteouts of his mask. Shame. “Yeah, I’ll cooperate, but I won’t tell you who Batman and I are.” Tim threaded his fingers and leaned forward. “But first I have a question for you. Why me?”

“How do you mean?”

“I’m hardly the first Robin,” Tim pointed out. “In fact the only first I am is the one to wear pants.” That was the first costume change he’d made and the one Bruce had capitulated on the easiest. Dick had fought him for a little bit because the scalies were a tribute, but Tim had broken into his room and left a razor and shaving cream by a sleeping Dick’s head, thus winning that battle. 

Don gave him a hard stare and Tim could tell that despite the soft tone she’d used she was just as hard as Gordon. His respect for her went up but that did little to curb his annoyance. “We got a tip.”

Well. Fuck. That old song and dance. Stupid tips. He’d had to deal with a few while his parents were travelling. Teachers and taxi drivers and other well wishers who made Tim’s life that much harder. But he dealt with them. He could deal with this. 

Tim leaned back, dropping his hands and folding them into his lap, waiting for her questions. 

The door opened and a cop passed Gordon a cup which the man quickly set on the table in front of Tim. By the smell it was _not_ coffee, so Tim ignored it in favor of staring Don down. 

“Does Batman hit you?” She started off easy.

“No.”

“Does he hurt you other ways?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Maybe not on purpose,” Don allowed and Tim could already see where this was going, but cutting her off was only going to make this go on longer, “but does he ever do it by accident? Grabbing you too hard. Maybe pinching you?”

Tim did not look to the ceiling and pray for lightning to strike him, but it was a near thing.  
  
“No.”

And so passed the next hour, with stupid questions and Tim being told to walk her through his days with Batman. It was boring and tedious to make sure he didn’t give away info that would reveal who they were.

“Does Batman ever touch you sexually?”  
  
That’s it. Tim was done. He was getting a withdrawal headache, his butt was numb from this god awful chairs, and he was missing his first solo patrol in a month to answer stupid questions. “ _Gordon_ ,” Tim whined his best whine, the one that could even make Alfred hesitate, “This is dumb and I want to go home.”  
  
“I agree kid but Batman said you’re here the rest of the night so just answer the goddamn question.”  
  
Tim sighed. “There is a shotgun in the closet and Agent A said if anyone bad touches me I’m to get him so he can get it, okay? Also, I am pretty sure I could break Batman’s wrist.” While he was Bruce, anyway. Batman’s gauntlets were pretty tough.

“And who is Agent A?”  
  
Tim vigorously shook his head. “I need coffee. Gordon, do you want coffee? I’m going to go grab coffee.” 

Without waiting for a response Tim stood, opened the window and jumped. It wasn’t far. He was only on the second floor so a quick roll killed all the momentum. There was a great local shop that all the cops hit a few blocks from here and Tim turned before remembering Batman’s instructions. No leaving the building.

Right. 

With a sigh Tim pushed open the main doors. Another bullpen, another round of silence. This time it was all beat cops and who they’d dragged in for the night. Tim gave them a half hearted wave before walking past, determined to find the breakroom. 

He did not find the breakroom. 

He did, however, find an exhausted cop at a computer, swearing at the thing as she opened tab after tab. It didn’t take long for Tim to feel sorry for the poor bastard as she cursed and closed yet another tab. 

“What are you looking for?” Tim asked.

“Employment records,” the woman muttered as she closed yet another tab. “I can close this case if I can just prove he worked at Gibbson Fisheries. These files are just such a mess.”

“I’m pretty good with computers,” Tim volunteered. He was also good with the mess that was the Gotham PD database. He’d been itching to clean it up but hacking into it to make it usable would have caused too much evidence to be considered contaminated. 

“If you can make it work I will give you my first born child,” the woman said, spinning the chair. 

Tim let out a wry grin. “I’m a little young for that, but I’d love a coffee.” 

She blinked at him. “You’re Robin.” She blinked again. “You’re kinda scrawny.”

“Hey,” Tim frowned in protest. He got that enough from criminals. “I’m wiry.” 

“Fuck it,” she threw her hands up. “This isn’t the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to me. I’m gonna go fetch that coffee. Go nuts, kid.”

Tim found the employment records in one minute and thirty three seconds. He leaned back, tapped a hand on his hip, and realized he had no idea how far away the break room was. Or even if she was coming back. She might have dismissed this as some sort of gas attack, so Tim could be here awhile. 

Maybe even long enough to fix the database?

X-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Don nearly jumped over the table when the kid bolted, but Jim just tilted his head to stretch his neck. He wasn’t surprised the kid had taken off, just that it had taken this long. Robin three was definitely the most patient of the bunch but even he had limits and Don had apparently found them. 

“We need to go after him!” Don said as she stuck her head out the window, looking for a puddle of green and blood red.  
  
Jim trashed his cigarette and pulled out another one. Hopefully he’d actually get to go light this sucker. “Kid’s long gone.”

Don huffed, “Batman promised-”

“And like any parent his kid said fuck that. You know what kids are like. Especially when you grill them like that. Hell, if you’d been talking to Barbara like that she’d also have gone for the window.”

Don turned on him and narrowed her eyes. “It’s not funny, Jim.”

“Ain’t laughing.”

Don tried to smooth down her skirt. “The deal’s been broken. We’ll need to try and bring in both Robin and Batman. I know we can’t let the public know who he is but we can always set the kid up with a new history and a new family. No one needs to know where he came from or where he went. He’ll be safe that way.”  
  
“Christ, Don, you’ve put a lot of thought into this.” It would never work. Batman would never let them disappear his Robin but it was the best attempt at a plan Jim had heard to separate the two.

“Kids shouldn’t be fighting crime.”

“Well, it’s a non-issue because we aren’t going to catch them again.” Jim had been not-catching Batman since the vigilante had first started. It was a good arrangement and he wasn’t going to change it up now. 

Jim’s phone rang in his pocket and he quickly answered, tension building in his shoulders. The last thing he needed was bad news to add to this shit night. 

“Sir?” came a tentative voice.

“Spit it out, Macaya.” The man was a young cop, and good, but he was as green as grass and still tip-toed like Jim was going to rat him out to his mother if he mucked up. 

“Robin is wandering around downstairs?”

Jim sighed. Damn. This would have been simpler if the kid had bolted. “Thanks, Macaya. Good job,” he added as an afterthought. He ended the call and his phone immediately began to ring again. This time Gordon had a good idea of what it was about. 

He turned to Don. “Good news for you. Kid’s still in the station.”

X-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Tim was on his third cup of coffee, if you could call it that. It was sludge. Caffeinated to hell, but still sludge. No wonder Gordon was cranky all the time if this is what he drank. But still, caffeine was caffeine and Tim’s mind was racing as he laid out the clues. “It’s not gang related, just made to look that way. See here? This symbol? It was used by the Falcones but it’s drawn wrong, like someone is trying to draw it from a picture they might have seen once or twice.”

“Robin.”  
  
“Hi Gordon,” Tim said absently as he pinned another string to the board leading to a headshot. “It was her brother. She obviously knew her killer and her brother was the only one who would have had enough muscle to swing a sledgehammer with any degree of accuracy. Other than the floor the house is fine, which means he hit her first swing while she was looking at him. If you compare the bootprint you found to his steel toed boots, not his sneakers, you’ll be able to close the case.

“Have you been giving him coffee?” Oh god, that was Don. It took every single bit of training Alfred had instilled in Tim to not just flip her off. Instead he picked up his cup and took a long pull of the cooling liquid, finishing the grains at the bottom of the cup. 

“Hey, he drinks it like a champ!” argued Hobson and Tim was suddenly inordinately fond of her. Plus the cold case she’d brought him had been interesting, not just lazy police work. And she’d put a little milk in his coffee. Not that that was how he took it but in this case it helped with its ungodly texture and she knew it. She probably had great taste in coffee. Tim needed to buy her real coffee. Nice coffee.

She was his favorite. 

“He is a child!” 

Gordon turned to Don with his eyebrows raised. “What age did you start drinking coffee?”

Don huffed. “I was older than him. He’s what, thirteen?”

Sixteen. Tim didn’t say that out loud but he was sick of people assuming he was young just because he was short. Short ninety year olds existed. Obviously he wasn’t ninety but his point remained. 

“Here! Try this one!” Wildes handed Tim a case and he flipped it open, scanning it before frowning.  
  
“I already solved this one,” Tim muttered, “Years ago. Why wasn’t it closed?”

He could feel Gordon peer over his shoulder. “What are you talking about, kid? We never had enough evidence to take it anywhere.”  
  
Tim started to thumb through the file faster. “I sent you pictures. I sent you fucking pictures,” he hissed. “This should have been closed four years ago!” He ran a hand through his hair. “It’s okay,” he told them, told himself. “I kept the negatives. You’ll just need to find Henry and I’ll have all the evidence you need. I’ll get Batman to look into if he kept trafficking.”

“Four years ago?” Don asked, aghast. “Batman was letting you spy on human traffickers four years ago?! You would have made a perfect target!”

_“Batman,”_ Tim said sharply, “didn’t let me do anything four years ago. He didn’t even know I existed.” Damn. If this case was botched, how many others. “I’m going to have to redevelop every photo I’ve ever sent to you guys.”  
  
Gordon sighed. “That won’t help. It’s Gotham. Do you know how many cold cases we have? We aren’t going to be able to match a collection of pictures to every one of them.” 

Tim flipped the file so Gordon could better see. “Yeah, but you only need to match them to the ones the “Viewfinder” submitted tips on.” Tim frowned at the name. “Seriously, the Viewfinder? That’s a stupid informant name. You couldn’t have at least given me something cool.”

“That was you?” Hobsons asked, aghast. “We thought you were dead!”

“Nah,” Tim shook his head, “Just got a little more proactive.”

“We started getting tips from you _seven years ago_ ,” Gordon stressed. 

Tim blinked. “Yeah. I remember. I was there.”

“Fuck,” Gordon slammed the door open and then slammed it closed as he left. 

Don, in the meantime, was looking at Tim with a pale expression on her face. “You’ve been doing this for seven years? You would have been a baby! Where were your parents?”

“Guam,” Tim answered before his brain caught up to his mouth. He flashed a cheeky grin in recovery, making the statement look like a lie. 

“So Batman found you wandering around the rooftops while you were a _small child_ and decided to train you? Is that it? He took a high risk child and put him in danger instead of providing him with protection.” Don’s eyes were clouded and her lips carved into a deep line. She was obviously livid.

Tim’s temper rose to match hers. “Batman did not find me. I found him! And I was perfectly fine without him. I joined him because he needed me, so don’t you dare assume that this is Batman’s fault!”

“Um,” Hobson eyed the door. “Maybe we should just-” She gave a half wave towards the exit. 

“No need!” Robin said sharply and followed Gordon’s example. Fuck this and fuck Batman. Tim was leaving. He stomped his way through the building, people parting for him like zipper teeth along a slider. “Fucking social workers,” he snarled, his hand the front door of the station. 

Glass exploded inward. 

Tim felt two impacts slam onto his chest, knocking him backwards onto the floor. Someone grabbed his collar, dragging him across the broken shards until he was partly on someone’s lap, his body pressed against something hard. 

His head was spinning. He must have hit it when he went down. 

“Man down, man down! Gun fire in main bullpen. Robin’s hit!” 

Tim coughed, testing his lungs. Bruised ribs but probably not cracked. Whatever caliber he’d been hit with was big, but not armor piercing. “I’m fine,” he wheezed. “I’m fine,” he said, this time more believably. 

Looks like Tim had found the tipster. 

He pushed himself to his knees, almost banging his head on the cheap metal desk he’d been wedged under. He needed to evacuate. His movements were hampered here, both by the building and the police. It wouldn’t do for Gotham to lose half the police force because someone was after Robin. 

A hand grabbed his wrist. “Get down!” Robin gave his rescuer a small smile but the latino man seemed anything but reassured. 

“Don’t worry. I’ve got this.” Tim jumped onto the desk and ran. As he expected, the cops were all ducked. And as expected, bullets aiming for center mass followed Tim as he hopped across the room, leaving holes in the walls and not the heads of people who’d taken cover. He dived through the door, his back hitting the frame as a bullet clipped his stomach. 

“Fuck,” Tim groaned, giving himself a second to catch his breath before crawling through the door into the windowless stairwell. He drew his staff as he heard footsteps pounding towards him. 

Gordon appeared at the top of the steps. “Robin!” He called, racing downwards. 

“I’m fine.” Tim waved him off. “I just need to get to the roof and jet.”

Gordon grabbed Tim’s elbow and started pulling him upwards. “That’s a terrible idea.”

“It’s a brilliant idea,” Tim argued, “unless you want to wait to see if he has explosives. I’m useless here. He’ll either follow me or I’ll be able to stop him, but I need to be out of the building.”  
  
“Goddammnit,” Gordon hissed but Tim could pick up the resignation in his voice. He let go of Tim’s arm and the two blasted their way up the stairs. They reached the door for the roof and Tim drew a deep breath as he grabbed his gun. Gordon drew his gun. “I’ll cover you.”

“Gordon!” Tim protested. 

“I’ll. Cover. You.” 

Bastard was as stubborn as Batman. “On three. One. Two-” Tim shoved the door open, diving across the roof and rolling, pulling his grapple so he could vanish into the night. 

He heard the sound of kevlar on flesh and turned to see Gordon crumpled on the roof. 

Over his body stood the Red Hood.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Gordon was fine. He’d wake up with one hell of a headache tomorrow, but Jason wasn’t going to kill the man. For one, the man did good work, especially for a cop in Gotham. The other thing was that would be declaring war on Barbie and had no doubt that even from her wheelchair she’d make his life a living hell if she didn’t engineer his death. The Bats didn’t kill but Barbara Gordon wasn’t a Bat, hadn’t been since she survived the Joker. Jason wasn’t willing to find out which lines she was only holding onto to have peace with Bruce. 

So Gordon was fine. 

Replacement looked like he was okay, but by the end of tonight he wouldn’t be.  
  
The tower was supposed to be a lesson, it was supposed to teach Bruce that there should be no more Robins, that he _couldn’t protect them_ . He’d left Replacement alive because, well- _a kid on his knees, holding himself gasping even as he stared defiantly. Terrified but not backing down, not admitting it-_ he didn’t know why he’d left Replacement alive. 

But he wasn’t going to make that mistake this time. 

“Did you seriously call CPS on Batman?” 

The haze of green dimmed. “Really? Is that how you really want to start this?” God this kid was weird. How the hell had Bruce found him? What did Bruce _see_ in him? If Jason had more time he might have pulled the answers from the little bastard, along with teeth. That would have been satisfying. The green hummed, his brain imagining the screams. But Batman had a police scanner and while the docks were far, Jason wasn’t willing to wait to see how fast Bruce could move these days. 

He pulled his gun and fired. 

The kid was still quick, but he was hurting from where Jason had sniped him and wasn’t able to readjust when Jason started aiming at where he would be instead of where he was. He took several slugs to the chest and there was the clinking of metal on concrete as the bullets fell from the armor onto the roof before the kid collapsed. No blood which meant Bruce had definitely upgraded the armor, but no amount of armor could make a kid immortal. 

The kid tried to pull out his fancy staff as he laid on the roof but Jason didn’t know what his plan was after that. He’d bet his helmet that Replacement had cracked ribs, maybe even broken ones.

He stepped on the kids arm and yanked the staff up. The kid let out a small whine when his wrist twisted as Jason over extended it backwards. Still, the brat slashed at Jason’s leg with a batarang and if his boots were any lower it probably would have been a problem.

His vision burned with emerald.

Jason kicked Replacement in the face. Not too hard. He wanted the kid awake. He wanted Bruce to know that another Robin died aware and in pain. 

“You know, I don’t know what I expected. I’d hoped that maybe B would be smart and finally pull you from the scene, but here you are, all broken and alone once again.” He shook his head as though disappointed. “I hate repeating myself, but sometimes it's what it takes for a lesson to sink it.” He twirled the staff. “It isn’t exactly a crowbar, but it will do the trick.”

A or B.

Acid on his skin.

Backhand or forehand. 

Green everywhere. 

Jason blinked as the kid gasped, his arm sticking in the wrong direction, blood running down his chin and his body folded over his hip. The staff was resting against the kid’s temple. He’d lost time. He’d lost _satisfaction_. “Is that all you’ve got?” He snarled. “You wouldn’t have tried to crawl out of that warehouse, would you have. You would have just laid there and waited for Batman to come save you, just waited to die. Fucking worthless.”

He raised the staff for the last time. _End this_ whispered the green. He agreed. Bruce would learn.

No. 

More.

Robins.

There was a crack of gunfire as something hit his back. Nothing serious. Probably police rounds. Still, his vision flared and the need for retaliation bayed in his blood. He spun the staff again, turning slowly, for full effect.

It wasn’t a cop who held the gun. 

He recognized her. He'd _called_ her in on this. Donalda. She was new since he’d died, and good. A lot of the street kids liked her, and talked about friends she’d placed. Placed with okay families. Ones who fed and clothed the kids and didn’t hit. The system wasn’t perfect but she was making it better, rooting out corruption hard and fast.

Jason really respected her. If she’d been around when he’d been picked up he never would have ended up with Bruce.  
  
Never would have died in Ethiopia. 

But she’d just shot him. 

“What the fuck was that for?” he snarled. They were on the same side. They were both cleaning up Gotham in their own way. 

“Step away from Robin.” She had a Bowery accent. Faint, like she’d trained herself out of it. Just like Jason had. Wash away your roots if you want to help the city. 

He snorted. “Kid knew what he was signing up for.”

“That kid,” she said shrilly, “has been wandering the streets playing vigilante for seven years! _Seven!_ He’s never known how to do anything else and if you kill him he never will! So you are going to step away from him or I am going to shoot you again!”

Bruce had been training the brat for _seven years_? He’d been planning on replacing Jason for that long?! Green started to glow before the part of his brain that could do basic math kicked in. That was longer than he’d known Bruce. That was longer than Dick had left for college. 

What the fuck. 

He poked the kid with the stick. “What the fuck she talking about?” 

Replacement, goddamn Replacement, flipped him the fucking bird. 

Jason was going to break that finger. 

The air changed and the staff was replaced with a gun faster than Bruce could draw one of his fancy little toys. “You’ve been training Replacement since before _Nightwing_ left?” Jason snarled. “Did I ever mean anything to you?”

Bruce froze, the way he did when he was completely caught off guard. 

“Really?” snarled Don, back on Jason’s side. “How young do you start training them? Do you have another small child stashed away?”

“I did not have any contact with Robin until _after_ Nightwing went to Blüdhaven,” B said carefully. “Nor did I meet him until _after_ the other Robin…”

Coward. Not willing to say it in front of the social worker? “Died,” Jason barked. “He fucking died. Alone and at the hands of a madman.”

Don gasped. Not a lot of people knew what happened to Robin number two. “You picked up a third kid after that?”

“Not a kid,” Replacement groaned and Jason almost shot him then and there. 

“He picked up me,” and that was Bruce shining through. Weary, battered Bruce. It wasn’t as satisfying as it should have been. “He’d already been wandering around since he was small and I couldn’t convince him to stop. What was I supposed to do? If he entered the system someone would have connected him to Viewfinder and he would have ended up dead.”

“Viewfinder?” Jason looked from Replacement to Bruce back down to Replacement. He’d heard of the tipster. Bruce had sent him looking for intel on the guy and all Jason had found was some shrimp with a camera on top of a roof taking pictures of stars…. _Motherfucker._

Replacement was Camera Tim. Fucking Tim. That tiny little camera dweeb that ran through crime alley sounding like he was from goddamn Bristol. The green cleared away. “Fuck!” Jason screamed, flinging the bo staff over the roof into the night. He placed the back of the gun against his helmet. “The little shit!”

“Fuck you too,” Replacement-Tim- groaned. Jason had spent hours trying to keep the kid off of the rooftops, steering him away from where he knew things were about to go down because the kid had an unerring ability to be headed in that direction. And it was on fucking purpose? 

“You know what?” Jason snarled, “Fuck it.” He pulled a grappling gun with one hand as he holstered the gun with bullets in the other. “I think you having to deal with this little idiot is worse than anything I could do to you.” The little stubborn rat shit eating bird brain. 

He fired the gun and vanished, catching the faint scream of “You let one of them _die?_ ” before the sound of the city took over. 

Well, at least Bruce’s night was going to be as shitty as his was. 

Camera Tim. 

Fuck.

  
  



End file.
